Hello

This time, the keyword is free gaps in your schedule, so I wanted to recommend a game you can enjoy by making use of those empty pockets of time.

In my case, I only do mileage daily quests right now, but there was a period when I played MapleStory M consistently. Back then, reaching level 250 was a fairly slow process, and I still remember logging in regularly and eventually hitting that mark.

What stood out to me at the time was that, because the game is fundamentally built around auto-battle and auto-play, there was not actually much time spent on manual control. Of course, if you add bossing and guild content on top of that, the time requirement naturally goes up, but when it comes to core progression and participating in events, it takes less time than you might expect.

With that in mind, if this is the kind of playstyle you have been looking for, I think this game is a solid option, which is why I wanted to share a few thoughts on it.

Auto-Battle System

You could say auto-battle is the foundation of MapleStory M. Once you join a party and press start, it runs on its own, and even if you close the game, auto-battle keeps going for the rest of your remaining time, which makes it extremely convenient. There also used to be no option to stop combat when leaving or when you were in a one-person party, but that was added through a patch, so there is now some protection against unexpected situations as well.

Once auto-battle ends, just make sure you do not forget to quickly claim daily attendance rewards and other rewards like these.

There is also a daily Hot Time period that increases EXP gained from party hunting, and it applies from 8:00 to 10:00, 12:00 to 14:00, and 17:00 to 24:00, with an extra period from 0:00 to 2:00 on weekends, so it is best to leave your party grinding running during those windows.

Daily Missions

The daily missions you more or less have to do are mainly split between Arcane and Authentic area daily quests, which give Symbols and EXP, and Mini Dungeon missions, which give EXP.

You can now also use this scheduler to have them progress automatically in sequence.

You can also complete missions by spending Mesos, and once you are past a certain level, using your auto-battle time in the Mini Dungeon just to clear this mission actually becomes inefficient, so people often say it is better to finish it quickly with Mesos and use your auto-battle time out in the field instead. If you do that, the only time you really spend is pressing the sweep button and running the daily quests.

Boss Content

Expedition and boss content can now also be entered whenever you want. Naturally, the more bosses you decide to run, the more play time that adds, but you can work through them whenever it suits your schedule.

Daily Content

The daily content you pretty much need to do also comes down to these four items, and these can be cleared very quickly as well.

• Edge of Space: you can clear it immediately just by entering and leaving

• Expedition/Boss: clear it immediately by defeating just 1 boss

• Mu Lung Dojo: once per week, save the floor you reached, then use the floor save function to clear it quickly

• Mini Dungeon: clear it with Mesos just like the daily mission

If you do it this way, it can realistically be finished in under 2 minutes.

Events that can be naturally cleared just by playing through the three things above

In MapleStory M, this big winter-style event season is already nearing its end, but during major event periods like this, a huge number of events are running at once. Even so, while the titles may differ, most of them are designed to be cleared naturally through the three gameplay loops mentioned above, so as long as you take a little time to understand what kind of event each one is, they are easy to participate in comfortably.

The events currently underway can be grouped by theme like this.

These are events that can be cleared through daily missions.

These are events that can be cleared by defeating level-range monsters through auto-battle.

Lastly, these are events you can participate in by defeating bosses. There is nothing extra you need to go out of your way to do here—just play as you normally would and make sure you do not forget to claim the rewards.

On top of that, even event story content like this is very convenient, since you can skip the story and just collect the rewards.

Also, this does not seem to be running right now, but there were often mini-games among the event coin activities as well. Unless one happened to come out with unusually awkward difficulty, they were generally nice because you could finish them very quickly, and I remember some events taking only around 20 seconds per round.

Other Content Can Also Be Cleared Quickly

Lastly, let us look at some other content that was not covered above but is still treated as nearly essential. The time required for these is not much different from what I mentioned earlier either. First, in MapleStory M right now, ticket-based content can be entered by using multiple tickets at once as shown above, so you only need to run it a single time.

These pieces of content cannot be auto-run in the background, but since each one has a short clear time, you can finish them quickly.

They also count toward weekly content missions, so you can pick up those rewards while you are at it.

First are the weekly Arcane and Authentic Dungeons. These two dungeon types, which give a large amount of EXP, also run automatically, and if you enter with quick progress enabled, they can be completed in under 2 minutes. The EXP rewards are very good, so these are definitely worth doing.

For the weekly content Monster Park, once you are past a certain level, the EXP itself is not especially meaningful, but you can buy items with the reward coins, and since it runs automatically, it can be completed in about 1 minute and 30 seconds.

The daily Day of the Week Dungeon is considered essential because it rewards Jewel items that raise your stats, and it takes about 20 seconds per day, while the weekly-entry Chaos version takes about the same amount of time.

For the daily content Pirate Davy Jones and Dimension Invasion, you can get auto-battle recharge tickets and EXP coupons as rewards, and these also run automatically, taking around 1 minute and 30 seconds and 2 minutes respectively.

Tangyoon's Cooking Class, which is daily content where you can get buff items, also runs automatically and can be completed in about 1 minute and 30 seconds.

That said, this content does require some manual input for controlling the heat at the start and adding the right ingredients in the middle. Even so, you can handle that conveniently by using Mesos.

Lastly, Kerning M Tower, where you can buy items such as auto-battle recharge tickets with coins, is monthly content, so you only need to do it once a month, and even if your stats are not high enough to reach the end, I found that you could still earn a decent amount of coins in about 10 minutes.

Besides the content I mentioned in this post, there is also plenty of guild content, Epic Dungeons, and more that I could not include because I currently cannot enter or clear them, but they do not seem to require much time either, so they look like good options for whatever free time you have.

It may look like a lot when written out like this, but as I mentioned, once you get used to it and build a routine, I think you will be able to get through it quickly. Since there is also official support for a PC client, I should also mention that you can play on a computer as well.

Thank you for reading.